Tag Archives: nurse practitioner

Advanced practice, critical care, Emergency medicine, medicine, Nursing

The Entitlement of Respect

If you want respect just because of a title, go to medical school.

That may sound harsh… but I believe it to be true.  Let me explain a little further.  I have heard time and time again how demeaning and insulting the term “midlevel provider” is when referring to Nurse Practitioners (NPs) and Physician Assistants (PAs).  Arguments such as “nothing I do is midlevel” have been made time and time again by NPs and PAs who are striving to gain the respect and recognition of their peers in the medical community.  The latest term that all sides have mostly agreed upon is “Advanced Practice Provider” or APP, although I feel that this term is still a somewhat vague representation of what our role entails in today’s healthcare system.  Continue reading The Entitlement of Respect →

critical care

The patient needs YOU…

As Frank and I embark on this new endeavor, I have contemplated a great deal about my first post.  I want my passion to shine through.  I love vents, ABG’s, lungs, airways, critical care and all that it encompasses.  I’ve deeply contemplated where I want this journey to begin, what I want to share, teach, impart.  My brain has been buzzing.  And then I had a bad night.

I started my usual night trucking down the hall, looking at my list, making plans.  Then I passed one of our critical care nurses who flagged me down.

“We’re bringing a bad one to the unit.”

Okay, ‘bad one’ is kind of my bag.  The nurse gives me some quick details and I tell her that is sounds like the patient is well covered and that I’ll stop by, weigh in, and see if anyone needs anything.

“No, she needs YOU.”

These words have become both a compliment and a curse. I know immediately what it means. It means a complicated social situation, confusion, sickness. It means that she is dying.  Continue reading The patient needs YOU… →